Saturday, December 11, 2010

Bones - The Doctor in the Photo recap/review with help from Hatts

Turkey dinner at Brennan’s house apparently includes a blow-by-blow analysis of the main course’s final moments in the slaughterhouse. Her guests, the whole squint crew (plus Hannah and Booth), were less-than-charmed by this party trick, but we found it adorable. Fortunately, they were saved from choking down their dinner by a call from Cam.

This week’s murder happened in a bad neighborhood about 11 months ago, and the body was found enmeshed in the roots of a growing tree. The female victim was a very sophisticated heart surgeon whose weight and height matched Brennan's. This might not have been enough to creep Bones out had she not found a dolphin ring identical to her own on the victim’s skeletal hand. The rest of this highly anticipated episode followed Brennan's decent into a delusional obsession over the similarities between her and the dead surgeon.

Brennan spent sleepless nights in the lab trying to solve the murder while listening to the victim’s recorded medical journal entries. But when Lauren (the victim) spoke in Brennan’s head, she spoke in Brennan’s own voice. As the episodes progressed, Brennan conducted imaginary conversations with the voice, because she felt that because of the similarities she shared with Lauren, she knew Lauren enough to do “her side.” Brennan was visited by the night guard (played by the same guy who was Keith Mars). This episode was a treat for Veronica Mars fans, because two V-Mars actors graced this Bones episode. The night guard quoted all the free Smithsonian lectures he attended to steer Bones deeper into her self-reflection. One of us thought this was a nicely written, sweet part for the absolutely loveable night guard. The other blogger thought it was weird and out-of-place.

It turned out that, in order to survive the emotional toll of the death of young patients, Lauren had become emotionally detached. Whenever she was under great emotional strain, yet felt numb, she would engage in dangerous activities “in order to feel something.” Her death was the result of a car accident in a bad neighborhood where Lauren was buying heroine from a drug dealer, just for the thrill of it. There was an airplane pilot who was in love with Lauren, and being closed-off emotionally because she was fragile, she rejected him. Brennan told the pilot that not giving him a chance was Lauren’s biggest regret. It was around this moment that Brennan realized that she had made the same mistake when she didn’t say yes to Booth last year.

DUH. Oh Brennan, if we didn’t love you so much….

Brennan hurried to the neighborhood where the murder occurred and bent down to check out a road reflector that had possibly tripped Lauren. Lost in the task of blindly following her intuition (a first for Brennan), she didn’t notice a car racing toward her in the pouring rain. Fortunately, Booth appeared to pull her out of harm’s way. He said he was “following her into a bad part of town and saving her life, you know, the usual.” On the ride home, Brennan told Booth that turning him down was something she regrets. A pained Booth quietly insisted that he had moved on, Hannah was not a consolation prize, and that Brennan would get over the pain, because he did. Brennan burst into tears, which isn’t common.

If you like the quippy, “git r done” Booth a la season one, he was back in this episode. This Brennan-centric episode had most of the side characters benched. It looks like Hannah is sticking around, so those of you who have grown fond of her despite her DATING BOOTH WHEN HE SHOULD BE WITH BONES are lucky. This episode had a different tone than most episodes, but it was a long time coming. Brennan reflected at the end that, during the time covered in the episode (three days), the world turned upside down. It was a strange one, that’s for sure.

It left us really sad, because Lauren helped us understand Brennan, and they are both pretty tragic figures. Plus, we really want Booth with Brennan. We can’t believe she reached out and then got her heart broken. UGH. We like a Bones episode that pays attention to the Booth/Brennan imminent love relationship though. This was less of a procedural episode, and more of an intrinsic, character-driven episode for longtime watchers of Bones. We think Brennan's realization and admission will, in the long run, propel the two closer toward a relationship, so we are happy, overall. Even so, that was tragic.

5 comments:

I love, love, LOVED this episode. I agree with missing the side characters who make me laugh out loud many times in every episode, but the rest of the episode was right on target.

Brennan is such a unique and perfect character. I've read the books and I enjoy watching TV Brennan develop and explore her depths just as much as Book Brennan. It is a rare bird. Part of me wanted Booth to pull Brennan into his arms and tell her that he still loved her and Hannah was history... but part of me acknowledged that it would be trite and forced.

I think ultimately it will lead to their eventual relationship. I mean, DUH. But she said she'd be fine alone, not "I'll be fine going back to refusing to see the validity of any monogamous relationship while sleeping with many different good looking men." Can't WAIT to see them together, and I whole-heartedly approve of the leap in Brennan's development.

Most importantly, I can't wait to see how Hannah's relationship with Booth dies. I keep trying to predict it, but I'm not clever enough. So far they seem to still be in the climb... growing together after issues instead of letting them fester and kill the relationship. I hope it isn't something lame like her dying. Then we'd have to pretend to be sad for a few episodes. Let's just have her crave adventure, resent Booth for tying her down, and book it, leaving Booth to realize that his adventurous fling was a way to hide from his feelings for our steadily AMAZING Brennan.

Your comment rings true. If he had accepted her right away, it wouldn't have felt right. Sigh.

We're just impatient.

We honestly think Hannah is going to get sniped. That's a good way to put off Booth/Brennan getting together right away (he will need time to get over her death). Then he will go get Brennan. Your way will be better though.

The other blogger reads the books and doesn't think it's necessary that Bones show-watchers become Bones book-readers. The Brennan in the books is vastly different from the one on the show. The books are enjoyable, but just because someone likes the show doesn't necessarily mean he or she will like the books.

Hahah I agree. You certainly do not have to read the books to appreciate the show. I believe Kathy Reichs (the author and the inspiration for Tempe) even said Tv Brennan is the younger, harsher version of Book Brennan. I enjoy the books. I am fascinated with Kathy Reichs' mind, which is startling similar to both her versions of Brennan, and I'm simply amazed by the wealth of knowledge she has. I encourage anyone who enjoys any books of that genre to read them... but I agree... just because you like the show does not mean you'll like the books.

And I'm totally down with Hannah being sniped. I just don't want to pretend to be sad. I'd rather her just go away so we can say we always knew what a beyotch she is.

About the bloggers

Ern is a lawyer. Ern's all-time favorite shows are LOST and Breaking Bad. Other favorites include Homeland and South Park. She also enjoys opera, water skiing, arguing, and movies. Ern responds to most of the comments, because they go directly to her phone. Ern also starts most of the posts and leaves them half done, as drafts, for Leeard to finish. As far as international visitors go, Ern is excited to see visitors from Germany, the UK, and Israel.

Leeard is a technology consultant and a nice Italian Catholic girl. Leeard's all-time favorite show is Gilmore Girls, but her favorite shows on right now are Game of Thrones, Pretty Little Liars, and The Vampire Diaries. Leeard can do your taxes, loves sports, and has an insane amount of pop culture knowledge. Leeard is excited to see visitors from Russia and Poland because she speaks conversational Russian and Polish (and Spanish).

We started this blog because of our insane addictions to TV. We thought that, while we were "wasting our lives," we would at least get writing and thinking practice out of it.